Black Sabbath: 13

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Black Sabbath — from left Tony Iommi, Ozzy Osbourne and Geezer Butler — couldn’t have found a better title for their comeback album than 13Robert Voets

Will Hodgkinson

Published at 12:02AM, June 7 2013

Ozzy Osbourne is back with the reunited Black Sabbath on 13. Sabbath have
wisely returned to their early Seventies proto-metal roots, with
ultra-heavy, sludge-slow riffs played out against Osbourne’s weedy but
threatening voice as he sings about God, Satan and other subjects that could
have come from the pages of a Dennis Wheatley novel. The epic eight-minute
opener End of the Beginning has all this and a squealing guitar solo
from Tony Iommi too. It’s knuckle-dragging biker rock at its finest.

When Sabbath first emerged, however, their upside-down crosses,
Lucifer-inspired chord sequences and tight denim jeans proved so disturbing
for